Guild Wars 2

Congrats to oRNG on the win in WTS2. (Congrats to Abjured on the win in WTS1, but old news.)

Around the time of WTS1, Cheese Mode was the undisputed top team in EU, and TCG was the second best in EU, though there were other teams somewhat close to it (such as 55hp). The Abjured was the second-best team in NA, though closer to the best than TCG was to CM. The teams practiced well, and the finals were very close. Abjured and TCG were close enough that it may have been just the small sample size that made Abjured win, although plenty of people say that Abjured was indeed better at the time. I pass no judgment on this subject, other than Abjured got the formal victory.

Around the time of WTS2, CM and TCG fell apart and recombined. Now oRNG had two people from the best team and 3 from the second best, and pulled ahead as the new possibly-best team in EU (though they and TCG were neck and neck in the qualifiers, and there are more good teams in EU as well, 55hp, S.H.P). In NA, Abjured was the undisputed best team, just as CM was around WTS1. Abjured lost equals or superiors to practice against, while oRNG had teams close in skill level. So, oRNG had better practice than Abjured, and possibly had better players than EU had in WTS1 (even though the WTS1 EU team was still really close to NA, and all the players were great). And, the winners were oRNG.

Maybe the Abjured could have won. Maybe not; maybe the WTS2 games were fully representative — at least they seem more representative than the WTS1 games because of the closeness and lag in WTS1. But oRNG was certainly [not NOT] in the running as an equal or superior, by the practice and membership arguments above.

Abjured is not a piece of kitten team, nor is it apparently the best team in the world at this time. They’ve had PR issues, but nobody should unquestioningly hate them because of it; for the most part they are good people… except in certain cases (OE and Backpack and Abjured, please be civil. It’s possible. Everyone would be happier.). They’re skilled players, although they’ve had a worse practice environment than EU teams. Maybe they will reclaim the title in the future, or maybe NA will develop other excellent teams. But for now, it seems like EU deserved this victory.

Props to Abjured for good sportsmanship, and props to oRNG for being skilled and being Civilized Gentlemen. Props to Dankening for having so many great games; they were some of the best ones to watch, even though they didn’t end up as the winners. Props to Heaven and Earth for doing much better than Chinese teams did in WTS1.

I kind of wanted Toker to start a fist fight, 1v5 the whole oRNG team and run out of the building with the giant check……

The only thing that broke those matchups were some bad calls and untimely wipes. either Orange Logo or Abjured could have won.

That means should nothing change roster wise it will be interesting to see what all happens. Though i may be slightly biased and be hoping for another upset to happen next tournament.

The abjured refused to scrim any team I made after I got cut.

I offered repeatedly.

Firebird.8324:

I kind of wanted Toker to start a fist fight, 1v5 the whole oRNG team and run out of the building with the giant check……

why would him, toker seems like a nice guy, even tho all the huge muscle and tatoos

lighter.2708:

Firebird.8324:

I kind of wanted Toker to start a fist fight, 1v5 the whole oRNG team and run out of the building with the giant check……

why would him, toker seems like a nice guy, even tho all the huge muscle and tatoos

toker, chaith and Rom are 3 of the coolest guys I ever met.

Zethyrius.8692:

Now oRNG had two people from the best team and 3 from the second best, and pulled ahead as the new best team in EU (though TCG did great against them in the qualifiers!

You are ignoring solid facts by saying that oRNG is the best EU team purely based on the qualifiers. You haven’t said they’re “possibly the new best team”, you’ve straight down said they’re “the new best team”. There are two teams that you’ve completely left out of the picture – 55hp monks and the french team team currently known as Sizzling Hot Pressure (IGN, EG, DG).

Let’s look at the past 5 Go4 cups, the past 5 ESL weekly cups and the January monthly final, not including the most recent Go4 and ESL because oRNG weren’t in them. I chose this selection since this is the period in which the french team has been around. oRNG has won 4 of these (ESL #64, Go4 #15/16/17). The french team has also won 4 of these (ESL #65/66/67, Go4 #14). 55hp has won 2 of these (Go4 #18 and the January monthly final).

As you can see, oRNG has not won the majority of these cups and have the same number of wins as the french team. The french team were unable to compete in the qualifiers (they weren’t even together when the qualifier teams were being decided) and 55hp were running with 2 pugs in the qualifiers. The french team even beat the mash of TCG + Nos and Tarcis, a tournament where TCG beat oRNG and also led to TCG getting temporarily suspended for the inclusion of those two.

To say that oRNG is currently the best EU team without the slightest mention of even the french team that is tied for wins despite being a less experienced team is just being extremely narrow minded and could possibly even be insulting to their main competitors in the EU scene. Abjured don’t have anything close to the same situation in NA since they have won every tournament in this time period, so it’s safe to say they are the top team in NA.

Just one view.

Random Weird Guy.3528:

Zethyrius.8692:

Now oRNG had two people from the best team and 3 from the second best, and pulled ahead as the new best team in EU (though TCG did great against them in the qualifiers!

You are ignoring solid facts by saying that oRNG is the best EU team purely based on the qualifiers. You haven’t said they’re “possibly the new best team”, you’ve straight down said they’re “the new best team”. There are two teams that you’ve completely left out of the picture – 55hp monks and the french team team currently known as Sizzling Hot Pressure (IGN, EG, DG).

Let’s look at the past 5 Go4 cups, the past 5 ESL weekly cups and the January monthly final, not including the most recent Go4 and ESL because oRNG weren’t in them. I chose this selection since this is the period in which the french team has been around. oRNG has won 4 of these (ESL #64, Go4 #15/16/17). The french team has also won 4 of these (ESL #65/66/67, Go4 #14). 55hp has won 2 of these (Go4 #18 and the January monthly final).

As you can see, oRNG has not won the majority of these cups and have the same number of wins as the french team. The french team were unable to compete in the qualifiers (they weren’t even together when the qualifier teams were being decided) and 55hp were running with 2 pugs in the qualifiers. The french team even beat the mash of TCG + Nos and Tarcis, a tournament where TCG beat oRNG and also led to TCG getting temporarily suspended for the inclusion of those two.

To say that oRNG is currently the best EU team without the slightest mention of even the french team that is tied for wins despite being a less experienced team is just being extremely narrow minded and could possibly even be insulting to their main competitors in the EU scene. Abjured don’t have anything close to the same situation in NA since they have won every tournament in this time period, so it’s safe to say they are the top team in NA.

Just one view.

I honestly haven’t been watching the EU Go4s. Thank you for info; edited some stuff in OP. But that furthers the point, that there was good competition. And it’s not insulting to call oRNG the best since they WERE the best team in EU for WTS2, according to the qualifiers, and according to you they share the top slot now? It’s like saying Abjured wasn’t the best NA team for WTS1. Absurd won more than Abjured, but for the WTS Abjured was top (well, Absurd also couldn’t qualify, but it’s somewhat similar).

Zethyrius.8692:

It’s like saying Abjured wasn’t the best NA team for WTS1. Absurd won more than Abjured, but for the WTS Abjured was top (well, Absurd also couldn’t qualify, but it’s somewhat similar).

No they didn’t, they only won 2 tournaments in the month preceding WTS1 (as well as the whole of the team’s history as far as I can see), Abjured even beat Absurd in the November final: http://play.eslgaming.com/guildwars2/global/gw2/major/go4guildwars2-northamerica/monthly-final-november-2014/rankings/

And we’re comparing 2 losses in the whole tournament history of Abjured compared to significantly more than 2 losses in the whole tournament history of oRNG.

I guess I have a really bad memory, because I remembered Absurd dominating the first few weeks. They won weeks 1 and 2, then Abjured week 3 and 4, then Absurd week 5, then Abjurd took over. Oh. The ESL site doesn’t have week 2. I guess I’m right for once. The Absurd was better than the Abjured, while it existed (before Nos left it). After WTS1, Nos joined Abjured and kicked OE, and Absurd was pretty much dead. During the Abjured’s pre-WTS time, it was not #1 overall, just #1 for the teams that were able to go to the WTS.

Zethyrius.8692:

I guess I have a really bad memory, because I remembered Absurd dominating the first few weeks. They won weeks 1 and 2, then Abjured week 3 and 4, then Absurd week 5, then Abjurd took over. Oh. The ESL site doesn’t have week 2. I guess I’m right for once. The Absurd was better than the Abjured, while it existed (before Nos left it). After WTS1, Nos joined Abjured and kicked OE, and Absurd was pretty much dead. During the Abjured’s pre-WTS time, it was not #1 overall, just #1 for the teams that were able to go to the WTS.

I would like to state, for the record, I was forced to play condi engi by my team for china and to view the losses as practice. Also, chaith and toker were FORCED to pick up the game after months of little practice and we had to get them up to snuff. If you actually payed any attention to vods before stating an opinion you’d clearly see that we struggled based on nos hard countering our only on-the-game roamer and toker and chaith out of practice by a kittenLOAD….

Alas, no one actually cares about gameplay. They just want to make their opinions without watching vods. Little did I know they thought bad of me because I can’t play a rabid condi engi vs a carrion necro while trying to get two new teammates up to snuff.

The idea of the absurd was to play with toker and chaith because nos and caed didn’t really make any attempt to go. That’s a fact. Being forced to play a class that is directly hard countered for “practice” is hardly any sort of indication of what the absurd was or how good they were…

PUHLEEZE. I picked up cele rifle in one day and almost beat the abjured with a brand spanking new team after china. Watch those vods too.

Ostricheggs.3742:

I would like to state, for the record, I was forced to play condi engi by my team for china and to view the losses as practice. Also, chaith and toker were FORCED to pick up the game after months of little practice and we had to get them up to snuff. If you actually payed any attention to vods before stating an opinion you’d clearly see that we struggled based on nos hard countering our only on-the-game roamer and toker and chaith out of practice by a kittenLOAD….

Alas, no one actually cares about gameplay. They just want to make their opinions without watching vods. Little did I know they thought bad of me because I can’t play a rabid condi engi vs a carrion necro while trying to get two new teammates up to snuff.

The idea of the absurd was to play with toker and chaith because nos and caed didn’t really make any attempt to go. That’s a fact. Being forced to play a class that is directly hard countered for “practice” is hardly any sort of indication of what the absurd was or how good they were…

PUHLEEZE. I picked up cele rifle in one day and almost beat the abjured with a brand spanking new team after china. Watch those vods too.

Yes, you were. Yes, they were. Yes, hard-countering. Yes, I watched all the NA Go4s until maybe the 8th or so. I saw the hard-countering and the improvement. But it IS an indication of how “good” they were, as that is judged by victory, not some unknown value of personal and team skill; even so, you said that your players were not fully up to speed, so I’d take that as the team overall WAS worse at the time. I wasn’t talking about you, but the team. I believe there were rumors that similarly, WTS2’s Chinese team won their qualifier by hard-countering the “real” best team?

You also stated that Absurd helped you practice, which is the entire point of saying that they were “better” than the Abjured in some way.

I don’t doubt that Abjured was an excellent team by the time of WTS1, that the pre-WTS1 Go4s were skewed, or that you weren’t the weakest link. I saw your first tournament games with rifle, and I won’t deny that it changed your matchups, and that you were still great before that (ie killing a condi necro in WTS1 as rabid engi = skill difference). This is supposed to be evaluation of results, not what-ifs or insults. I know you’ve had your more-than-fair share of incoming and outgoing salt, so maybe it was just too easy for you to read it that way. Sorry about that.

Compare the results before and after WTS1 is not fair.
Abjured was a good team and they practise a lot with OE. They become better and better. During this process they lost some games vs Absurd. At WTS1 they were the best team because of the process and because of OE. At WTS1 they had a plan and they reached the top level.

After WTS1 they kicked OE but the tactics, the rotations, the teamfights were perfect. So they were undefeded because they took the long way with OE.

I always liked that thing called:
- Biting the hand that feeds you

Hard to disagree with original post except in one regard, Adjured really never had a prayer of winning, Seriously 4 games lost, one of which by 300+ points to a team that was obviously better.

Lexiceta.4156:

Hard to disagree with original post except in one regard, Adjured really never had a prayer of winning, Seriously 4 games lost, one of which by 300+ points to a team that was obviously better.

They were not better.

Necro is unplayable vs thief+guard ( or thief-mes, for the sake of arguing).

Nec is viable only if the other teams plays without 2 zerks, otherwise even longbow ranger+ thief/guard reks him.

Ofc i’m talking about equal skill level, something you rarely see on NA, mostly cuz teams disband-reform like night and day, often inglobing new players ( and this is a really good thing tho).

I do think team comp was the determining factor. oRNG was willing to continue switching up comps until they found a synergy that really worked (talking prior to WTS), and they made a great decision to go with the comp they did.

Tage made some of the most impressive medi guard plays I can remember seeing, and Frae did an amazing job of dropping the cele players as well as getting constant decaps.

In the VODs I can see where some of Abjured’s mistakes were made. There were times when Phanta kept pushing far even though mid was open, and oRNG was defending far because they knew he was going to push (it became too predictable – had Phanta gone mid he would have got a decap instead of a 1v1 on an enemy node)

But all in all both teams played really well and from where I’m sitting it looks like oRNG had a comp advantage and exploited it to the max (most often being destroying Nos and winning 5v4)

If instead of Nos the Abjured had… say… Tarcis, I don’t think there would have been enough weakness for oRNG to exploit and make the plays that they did.

I should add that I also don’t think it was a weakness in how Nos played. It was most likely that Necro still isn’t balanced and specifically needs a buff, but part of it could be that Abjured plays such a 3-point spread all the time that maybe that strategy just doesn’t provide enough support for a Necro. This comes down to the fact that they probably would have figured out the solution sooner if they had the sort of competition in NA that oRNG has had in EU.

Lexiceta.4156:

Hard to disagree with original post except in one regard, Adjured really never had a prayer of winning, Seriously 4 games lost, one of which by 300+ points to a team that was obviously better.

“never had a prayer”
thats why all of the first 3 games were won by oRNG by late game come backs, some of which were very large come backs.

I find it funny that before WTS everybody was like NA>EU blah blah blah, Now NA got rekt in the WTS and ya´ll trying to find a reason why Abjured lost. I´ll give you a simple reason: oRNG played better. They were hungry and wanted to win more. As simple as that. Now quit your kittenness and move on. NA will get their chance in the next WTS.
But till then…….EU>NA deal with it huehuehuehue.

Booms.2594:

Lexiceta.4156:

Hard to disagree with original post except in one regard, Adjured really never had a prayer of winning, Seriously 4 games lost, one of which by 300+ points to a team that was obviously better.

“never had a prayer”
thats why all of the first 3 games were won by oRNG by late game come backs, some of which were very large come backs.

I have to agree, there were some very obvious mistakes made that even a PvP newb can see on stream. Like reinforcing a losing teamfight instead of taking the free caps. The greed and bloodlust was real, the objective gameplay was lost on stage and it was pretty clear whoever was shot calling goofed.

Quintoozla.7893:

I find it funny that before WTS everybody was like NA>EU blah blah blah, Now NA got rekt in the WTS and ya´ll trying to find a reason why Abjured lost. I´ll give you a simple reason: oRNG played better. They were hungry and wanted to win more. As simple as that. Now quit your kittenness and move on. NA will get their chance in the next WTS.
But till then…….EU>NA deal with it huehuehuehue.

Absolutely agree that oRNG played better. That’s clear on the sole basis that they were declared the winners.

A main topic in this thread is WHY oRNG was better than Abjured. I personally have no bias toward EU or NA. I favor teams that are good. When I first learned that oRNG formed, I thought that it was probably better than Abjured because it combined two teams that were pretty much equal or better. It was within the realm of possibility for Abjured to “git gud son” and beat them, but that apparently didn’t happen. And it was within the realm of possibility for teams to become better than oRNG or Abjured, but that did not happen before the qualifiers, at least results-wise.

Quintoozla.7893:

I find it funny that before WTS everybody was like NA>EU blah blah blah, Now NA got rekt in the WTS and ya´ll trying to find a reason why Abjured lost. I´ll give you a simple reason: oRNG played better. They were hungry and wanted to win more. As simple as that. Now quit your kittenness and move on. NA will get their chance in the next WTS.
But till then…….EU>NA deal with it huehuehuehue.

analyzing why you lost is the first step to getting better broski

insanemaniac.2456:

Quintoozla.7893:

I find it funny that before WTS everybody was like NA>EU blah blah blah, Now NA got rekt in the WTS and ya´ll trying to find a reason why Abjured lost. I´ll give you a simple reason: oRNG played better. They were hungry and wanted to win more. As simple as that. Now quit your kittenness and move on. NA will get their chance in the next WTS.
But till then…….EU>NA deal with it huehuehuehue.

analyzing why you lost is the first step to getting better broski

I might have used the wrong word Excuse not reason.

Quintoozla.7893:

insanemaniac.2456:

Quintoozla.7893:

I find it funny that before WTS everybody was like NA>EU blah blah blah, Now NA got rekt in the WTS and ya´ll trying to find a reason why Abjured lost. I´ll give you a simple reason: oRNG played better. They were hungry and wanted to win more. As simple as that. Now quit your kittenness and move on. NA will get their chance in the next WTS.
But till then…….EU>NA deal with it huehuehuehue.

analyzing why you lost is the first step to getting better broski

I might have used the wrong word Excuse not reason.

oh, just trying to gloat? forget i said anything then.

Seems that everyone is overlooking that they lost by 300+ when it counted the most.

Lexiceta.4156:

Seems that everyone is overlooking that they lost by 300+ when it counted the most.

They were against a team that consists of much better players. It was expected that they would lose.